We present the first spatial clustering measurements of z \sim 1 , 24 \mu m-selected , star forming galaxies in the Great Observatories Origins Deep Survey ( GOODS ) .
The sample under investigation includes 495 objects in GOODS-South and 811 objects in GOODS-North selected down to flux densities of f _ { 24 } > 20 \mu Jy and z _ { AB } < 23.5 mag , for which spectroscopic redshifts are available .
The median redshift , IR luminosity and star formation rate ( SFR ) of the samples are z \sim 0.8 , L _ { IR } \sim 4.4 \times 10 ^ { 10 } L _ { \odot } , and SFR \sim 7.6 M _ { \odot } yr ^ { -1 } , respectively .
We measure the projected correlation function w ( r _ { p } ) on scales of r _ { p } = 0.06 - 10 h ^ { -1 } Mpc , from which we derive a best fit comoving correlation length of r _ { 0 } = 4.0 \pm 0.4 h ^ { -1 } Mpc and slope of \gamma = 1.5 \pm 0.1 for the whole f _ { 24 } > 20 \mu Jy sample after combining the two fields .
We find indications of a larger correlation length for objects of higher luminosity , with Luminous Infrared Galaxies ( LIRGs , L _ { IR } > 10 ^ { 11 } L _ { \odot } ) reaching r _ { 0 } \sim 5.1 h ^ { -1 } Mpc .
This would imply that galaxies with larger SFRs are hosted in progressively more massive halos , reaching minimum halo masses of \sim 3 \times 10 ^ { 12 } M _ { \odot } for LIRGs .
We compare our measurements with the predictions from semi-analytic models based on the Millennium simulation .
The variance in the models is used to estimate the errors in our GOODS clustering measurements , which are dominated by cosmic variance .
The measurements from the two GOODS fields are found to be consistent within the errors .
On scales of the GOODS fields , the real sources appear more strongly clustered than objects in the Millennium-simulation based catalogs , if the selection function is applied consistently .
This suggests that star formation at z \sim 0.5 –1 is being hosted in more massive halos and denser environments than currently predicted by galaxy formation models .
Mid-IR selected sources appear also to be more strongly clustered than optically selected ones at similar redshifts in deep surveys like the DEEP2 Galaxy Redshift Survey and the VIMOS-VLT Deep Survey ( VVDS ) , although the significance of this result is \lesssim 3 \sigma when accounting for cosmic variance .
We find that LIRGs at z \sim 1 are consistent with being the direct descendants of Lyman Break Galaxies and UV-selected galaxies at z \sim 2 –3 , both in term of number densities and clustering properties , which would suggest long lasting star-formation activity in galaxies over cosmological timescales .
The local descendants of z \sim 0.5 –1 star forming galaxies are not luminous IR galaxies but are more likely to be normal , L < L _ { * } ellipticals and bright spirals .